A bench of Supreme Court including Justice K S Radhakrishnan and Justice Dipak Mishra asked the Tamil Nadu government to take steps to increase seats in educational institutions as students with 99% marks were not getting admission in medical and engineering colleges. Those additional seats shall have to be created to accommodate meritorious students from the open category who fail to get admissions because of 69% reservation for backward class in higher education.

The court passed the order on a petition filed by some students contending that reservation exceeding 50% in educational institutions and government jobs was in contravention to the mandate of the apex court judgment. The students had challenged the Tamil Nadu Backward Classes, Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Reservation of seats in educational institutions and of appointment or posts in the services under the state) Act, 1993, which provided 69% reservation in violation of the judgement passed by the SC a few years ago.

The Supreme Court had sought a response from the Government of Tamil Nadu on September 10 on the petition.

The Directorate of Medical Education, which is responsible for admitting students to medical colleges affiliated to the state medical university, follows a special formula wherein it allows students from the reserved category to take seats in colleges of their choice. The formula is a ‘looping system’, which is advantageous to reserved category students as they can use their caste certificate in the open category itself. Many cases have been filed against the looping system, which affects many forward community students.

Tamil Nadu has about 18 government medical colleges and a dozen more private colleges affiliated to the state medical university. Together, they offer more than 2,661. Though Tamil Nadu has the largest number of medical colleges, the increase in government medical colleges will benefit many more students. It is economical to study in a government medical college because tuition fee is less than Rs 5000 a year.

Students are allotted medical and engineering colleges based on merit and the reservation rules. Almost every year, advocates like K M Vijayan move the court on behalf of forward community students denied seats in medical colleges.